The Strange Library
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Men Without Women
- Stories
- By: Haruki Murakami, Philip Gabriel - translator, Ted Goossen - translator
- Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 7 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 739
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 667
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 667
Across seven tales, Haruki Murakami brings his powers of observation to bear on the lives of men who, in their own ways, find themselves alone. Here are vanishing cats and smoky bars, lonely hearts and mysterious women, baseball and the Beatles, woven together to tell stories that speak to us all. Marked by the same wry humor that has defined his entire body of work, in this collection Murakami has crafted another contemporary classic.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Not a place to start with Murakami
- By Golanka on 06-20-17
By: Haruki Murakami, and others
-
Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World
- By: Haruki Murakami
- Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 14 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 600
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 546
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 547
Across two parallel narratives, Murakami draws listeners into a mind-bending universe in which Lauren Bacall, Bob Dylan, a split-brained data processor, a deranged scientist, his shockingly undemure granddaughter, and various thugs, librarians, and subterranean monsters collide to dazzling effect. What emerges is a novel that is at once hilariously funny and a deeply serious meditation on the nature and uses of the mind.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Highly recommend
- By Amazon Customer on 07-23-18
By: Haruki Murakami
-
After Dark
- By: Haruki Murakami
- Narrated by: Janet Song
- Length: 5 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 401
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 299
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 301
Here is a short, sleek novel of encounters, set in Tokyo during the witching hours between midnight and dawn, and every bit as gripping as Haruki Murakami's masterworks The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle and Kafka on the Shore. At its center are two sisters: Eri, a fashion model slumbering her way into oblivion, and Mari, a young student soon led from solitary reading at an anonymous Denny's toward people whose lives are radically different from her own.
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
Intriguing book, Poor Narration
- By Ellen Clary on 07-27-08
By: Haruki Murakami
-
Killing Commendatore
- A Novel
- By: Haruki Murakami, Philip Gabriel - translator, Ted Goossen - translator
- Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 28 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 1,863
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 1,710
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 1,706
In Killing Commendatore, a 30-something portrait painter in Tokyo is abandoned by his wife and finds himself holed up in the mountain home of a famous artist, Tomohiko Amada. When he discovers a previously unseen painting in the attic, he unintentionally opens a circle of mysterious circumstances. To close it, he must complete a journey that involves a mysterious ringing bell, a two-foot-high physical manifestation of an Idea, a dapper businessman who lives across the valley, a precocious 13-year-old girl, a Nazi assassination attempt during World War II in Vienna.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
A Masterpiece and A Good Novel To Start
- By Elif Kaya on 10-18-18
By: Haruki Murakami, and others
-
Dance Dance Dance
- A Novel
- By: Haruki Murakami, Alfred Birnbaum - translator
- Narrated by: Josh Bloomberg
- Length: 12 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 312
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 277
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 279
As he searches for a mysteriously vanished girlfriend, Haruki Murakami's protagonist plunges into a wind tunnel of sexual violence and metaphysical dread in which he collides with call girls, plays chaperone to a lovely teenaged psychic, and receives cryptic instructions from a shabby but oracular Sheep Man. Dance Dance Dance is a tense, poignant, and often hilarious ride through the cultural Cuisinart that is contemporary Japan, a place where everything that is not up for sale is up for grabs.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Compelling!
- By karen on 12-22-16
By: Haruki Murakami, and others
-
Sputnik Sweetheart
- By: Haruki Murakami
- Narrated by: Adam Sims
- Length: 7 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 375
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 338
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 339
K is madly in love with his best friend, Sumire, but her devotion to a writerly life precludes her from any personal commitments. At least, that is, until she meets an older woman to whom she finds herself irresistibly drawn. When Sumire disappears from an island off the coast of Greece, K is solicited to join the search party - and finds himself drawn back into her world and beset by ominous visions.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Lonely?
- By Bulent Basaran on 11-10-16
By: Haruki Murakami
-
Men Without Women
- Stories
- By: Haruki Murakami, Philip Gabriel - translator, Ted Goossen - translator
- Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 7 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 739
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 667
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 667
Across seven tales, Haruki Murakami brings his powers of observation to bear on the lives of men who, in their own ways, find themselves alone. Here are vanishing cats and smoky bars, lonely hearts and mysterious women, baseball and the Beatles, woven together to tell stories that speak to us all. Marked by the same wry humor that has defined his entire body of work, in this collection Murakami has crafted another contemporary classic.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Not a place to start with Murakami
- By Golanka on 06-20-17
By: Haruki Murakami, and others
-
Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World
- By: Haruki Murakami
- Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 14 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 600
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 546
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 547
Across two parallel narratives, Murakami draws listeners into a mind-bending universe in which Lauren Bacall, Bob Dylan, a split-brained data processor, a deranged scientist, his shockingly undemure granddaughter, and various thugs, librarians, and subterranean monsters collide to dazzling effect. What emerges is a novel that is at once hilariously funny and a deeply serious meditation on the nature and uses of the mind.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Highly recommend
- By Amazon Customer on 07-23-18
By: Haruki Murakami
-
After Dark
- By: Haruki Murakami
- Narrated by: Janet Song
- Length: 5 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 401
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 299
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 301
Here is a short, sleek novel of encounters, set in Tokyo during the witching hours between midnight and dawn, and every bit as gripping as Haruki Murakami's masterworks The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle and Kafka on the Shore. At its center are two sisters: Eri, a fashion model slumbering her way into oblivion, and Mari, a young student soon led from solitary reading at an anonymous Denny's toward people whose lives are radically different from her own.
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
Intriguing book, Poor Narration
- By Ellen Clary on 07-27-08
By: Haruki Murakami
-
Killing Commendatore
- A Novel
- By: Haruki Murakami, Philip Gabriel - translator, Ted Goossen - translator
- Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 28 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 1,863
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 1,710
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 1,706
In Killing Commendatore, a 30-something portrait painter in Tokyo is abandoned by his wife and finds himself holed up in the mountain home of a famous artist, Tomohiko Amada. When he discovers a previously unseen painting in the attic, he unintentionally opens a circle of mysterious circumstances. To close it, he must complete a journey that involves a mysterious ringing bell, a two-foot-high physical manifestation of an Idea, a dapper businessman who lives across the valley, a precocious 13-year-old girl, a Nazi assassination attempt during World War II in Vienna.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
A Masterpiece and A Good Novel To Start
- By Elif Kaya on 10-18-18
By: Haruki Murakami, and others
-
Dance Dance Dance
- A Novel
- By: Haruki Murakami, Alfred Birnbaum - translator
- Narrated by: Josh Bloomberg
- Length: 12 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 312
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 277
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 279
As he searches for a mysteriously vanished girlfriend, Haruki Murakami's protagonist plunges into a wind tunnel of sexual violence and metaphysical dread in which he collides with call girls, plays chaperone to a lovely teenaged psychic, and receives cryptic instructions from a shabby but oracular Sheep Man. Dance Dance Dance is a tense, poignant, and often hilarious ride through the cultural Cuisinart that is contemporary Japan, a place where everything that is not up for sale is up for grabs.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Compelling!
- By karen on 12-22-16
By: Haruki Murakami, and others
-
Sputnik Sweetheart
- By: Haruki Murakami
- Narrated by: Adam Sims
- Length: 7 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 375
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 338
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 339
K is madly in love with his best friend, Sumire, but her devotion to a writerly life precludes her from any personal commitments. At least, that is, until she meets an older woman to whom she finds herself irresistibly drawn. When Sumire disappears from an island off the coast of Greece, K is solicited to join the search party - and finds himself drawn back into her world and beset by ominous visions.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Lonely?
- By Bulent Basaran on 11-10-16
By: Haruki Murakami
-
Wind/Pinball
- Two Novels
- By: Haruki Murakami, Ted Goossen - translator
- Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 7 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 312
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 289
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 289
In the spring of 1978, a young Haruki Murakami sat down at his kitchen table and began to write. The result: two remarkable short novels - Hear the Wind Sing and Pinball, 1973 - that launched the career of one of the most acclaimed authors of our time.
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4 out of 5 stars
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A Must For Murakami Fans
- By Jay Quintana on 08-23-15
By: Haruki Murakami, and others
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Underground
- The Tokyo Gas Attack and the Japanese Psyche
- By: Haruki Murakami
- Narrated by: Feodor Chin, Ian Anthony Dale, Janet Song
- Length: 13 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 204
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 186
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 185
On a clear spring day in 1995, five members of a religious cult unleashed poison gas on the Tokyo subway system. In attempt to discover why, Haruki Murakmi talks to the people who lived through the catastrophe, and in so doing lays bare the Japanese psyche. As he discerns the fundamental issues that led to the attack, Murakami paints a clear vision of an event that could occur anytime, anywhere.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Just as you breathe, you dream your story
- By Darwin8u on 08-26-15
By: Haruki Murakami
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Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman
- By: Haruki Murakami
- Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor, Ellen Archer
- Length: 12 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 111
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 99
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 101
The 24 stories that make up Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman generously express the incomparable Haruki Murakami’s mastery of the form. Here are animated crows, a criminal monkey, and an ice man, as well as the dreams that shape us and the things for which we might wish. From the surreal to the mundane, these stories exhibit Murakami’s ability to transform the full range of human experience in ways that are instructive, surprising, and entertaining.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Fantastic, just like how all Murakami books are
- By MM on 05-05-15
By: Haruki Murakami
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A Wild Sheep Chase
- A Novel
- By: Haruki Murakami
- Narrated by: Rupert Degas
- Length: 9 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 821
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 742
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 746
An advertising executive receives a postcard from a friend and casually appropriates the image for an advertisement. What he doesn't realize is that included in the scene is a mutant sheep with a star on its back, and in using this photo he has unwittingly captured the attention of a man who offers a menacing ultimatum: Find the sheep or face dire consequences.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Magic realism just the way I like it from Murakami
- By Chris Abraham on 01-04-14
By: Haruki Murakami
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The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
- A Novel
- By: Haruki Murakami
- Narrated by: Rupert Degas
- Length: 26 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 3,878
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 3,534
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 3,534
In a Tokyo suburb, a young man named Toru Okada searches for his wife’s missing cat - and then for his wife as well - in a netherworld beneath the city’s placid surface. As these searches intersect, he encounters a bizarre group of allies and antagonists.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Fantastical story, poor choices by narrator
- By Diana on 03-18-16
By: Haruki Murakami
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Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and his Years of Pilgrimage
- A novel
- By: Haruki Murakami, Philip Gabriel (translator)
- Narrated by: Bruce Locke
- Length: 10 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 1,233
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 1,106
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Story4 out of 5 stars 1,107
The new novel - a book that sold more than a million copies the first week it went on sale in Japan - from the internationally acclaimed author, his first since IQ84. Here he gives us the remarkable story of Tsukuru Tazaki, a young man haunted by a great loss; of dreams and nightmares that have unintended consequences for the world around us; and of a journey into the past that is necessary to mend the present. It is a story of love, friendship, and heartbreak for the ages.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Beautiful Story. Odd dialogue narration
- By Babs on 12-02-15
By: Haruki Murakami, and others
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What I Talk about When I Talk about Running
- A Memoir
- By: Haruki Murakami
- Narrated by: Ray Porter
- Length: 4 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 2,578
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 2,069
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 2,071
From the best-selling author of Kafka on the Shore comes this rich and revelatory memoir about writing and running and the integral impact both have made on his life. Equal parts training log, travelogue, and reminiscence, this revealing memoir covers Murakami's four-month preparation for the 2005 New York City Marathon. Settings range from Tokyo, where he once shared the course with an Olympian, to the Charles River in Boston, among young women who outpace him.
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5 out of 5 stars
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It is what it says it is
- By Rick on 03-10-09
By: Haruki Murakami
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South of the Border, West of the Sun
- A Novel
- By: Haruki Murakami, Philip Gabriel (translator)
- Narrated by: Eric Loren
- Length: 6 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 501
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 439
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Story4 out of 5 stars 443
Born in 1951 in an affluent Tokyo suburb, Hajime - beginning in Japanese - has arrived at middle age wanting for almost nothing. The postwar years have brought him a fine marriage, two daughters, and an enviable career as the proprietor of two jazz clubs. Yet a nagging sense of inauthenticity about his success threatens Hajime's happiness. And a boyhood memory of a wise, lonely girl named Shimamoto clouds his heart.
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4 out of 5 stars
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A River of Unmindfulness
- By Darwin8u on 10-12-13
By: Haruki Murakami, and others
-
Hear the Wind Sing
- By: Haruki Murakami, Ted Goossen - translator
- Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 2 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 75
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 69
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 68
Hear the Wind Sing is the first novel by Haruki Murakami. First published in the June 1979 issue of Gunzo, one of the most influential literary magazines in Japan, it was published one month later as a book. Hear the Wind Sing is the first book in the Trilogy of the Rat, a series of independent novels that include Pinball, 1973 and A Wild Sheep Chase, followed by the epilogue Dance Dance Dance.
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5 out of 5 stars
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vignette
- By zaid on 08-25-18
By: Haruki Murakami, and others
-
The Elephant Vanishes
- Stories
- By: Haruki Murakami, Alfred Birnbaum (translator), Jay Rubin (translator)
- Narrated by: Teresa Gallagher, John Chancer, Walter Lewis, and others
- Length: 10 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 142
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 124
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 123
With the same deadpan mania and genius for dislocation that he brought to his internationally acclaimed novels A Wild Sheep Chase and Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, Haruki Murakami makes this collection of stories a determined assault on the normal. A man sees his favorite elephant vanish into thin air; a newlywed couple suffers attacks of hunger that drive them to hold up a McDonald's in the middle of the night; and a young woman discovers that she has become irresistible to a little green monster who burrows up through her backyard.
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1 out of 5 stars
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dull
- By michelle-lee rodgers on 01-06-19
By: Haruki Murakami, and others
-
Norwegian Wood
- By: Haruki Murakami
- Narrated by: John Chancer
- Length: 13 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 1,330
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 1,188
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Story4 out of 5 stars 1,194
This stunning and elegiac novel by the author of the internationally acclaimed Wind-Up Bird Chronicle has sold over four million copies in Japan and is now available to American audiences for the first time. It is sure to be a literary event.
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5 out of 5 stars
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A Beautiful, Wistful...
- By Douglas on 02-18-16
By: Haruki Murakami
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Kafka on the Shore
- By: Haruki Murakami
- Narrated by: Sean Barrett, Oliver Le Sueur
- Length: 19 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 3,426
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 3,095
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 3,091
With Kafka on the Shore, Haruki Murakami gives us a novel every bit as ambitious and expansive as The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, which has been acclaimed both here and around the world for its uncommon ambition and achievement, and whose still-growing popularity suggests that it will be read and admired for decades to come.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Wonderful Story, Perfectly Read
- By Jennifer Dickinson on 09-14-14
By: Haruki Murakami
Publisher's Summary
From internationally acclaimed author Haruki Murakami - a fantastical short novel about a boy imprisoned in a nightmarish library.
A lonely boy, a mysterious girl, and a tormented sheep man plot their escape from the nightmarish library of internationally acclaimed, best-selling Haruki Murakami's wild imagination.
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What listeners say about The Strange Library
Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Tim
- 12-24-15
Wicked Fairy Tale
I overlook this audiobook many times before because it's only an hour long. Since Audible had a 50% off sale, I thought to myself that I should give "The Strange Library" a try. I've been telling my book club that they should read more Haruki Murakami because his writing style is so different that you can't help for wanting more. Thus far, I've listened to all of Murakami's titles that Audible has to offer.
"The Strange Library" is another strange one from Haruki Murakami. A boy going to a library, talking to the Sheep Man and somehow being in prison for not reading enough.
What a great wicked fairy tale!
You better read more before the Sheep Man gets you. Simply brilliant bedtime story for your little ones to do their school work.
2 people found this helpful
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance3 out of 5 stars
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Story3 out of 5 stars
- Manny
- 09-18-16
It was okay
I swear Ive seen a Macaulay Culkin movie with a similar plot, its way okay. I would buy the print version instead.